Pep'rJack
Active Member
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What are your thoughts re this? I'm inclined to vote for MMP, but I'm wary of unforeseen consequences. Aside from possible gridlock and other things mentioned in the article, what do you see as the 'risks' of switching to this system?
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You say you want a referendum?
Actually, the majority of Ontarians aren't even aware of the upcoming vote that could alter the province's political landscape forever. And the ones who are aware are trying to understand what it all means
by Chris Bilton
Eye Weekly
August 30, 2007
http://www.eyeweekly.com/eye/issue/issue_08.30.07/city/news.php
While the 2003 Ontario election carried with it a euphoric post-Harris glow of a fresh new start, one significant thing remained unchanged: a minority government was still wielding a majority rule. Surely the fact that the Liberals could hold 70 per cent of the seats while only receiving 46 per cent of the popular vote had to be the result of some kind of residual common sense reorganization. But, in actual fact, every Ontario government since 1937 has technically been a minority. Despite both parties winning landslide elections, neither Harris' Conservatives nor even Dalton McGuinty's Liberals have managed to attract even half of the total votes.
Under an alternate system, namely the Mixed-Member Proportional (MMP) system being proposed in this fall's electoral referendum, the last election's results would have looked more like this: a Liberal minority government with the Conservatives and NDP together holding the balance of power, and the Green party coming within about 8,000 votes of getting an actual seat in the house.
Wait a minute. What's an MMP? And who said anything about a referendum?
So apparently nearly two-thirds of Ontarians aren't even aware of what their options are in the Oct. 10 referendum. But that doesn't change the fact that MMP represents the first ever choice of an alternative to our current system. A citizen's assembly made up of a random cross-section of 107 Ontarians (one from each riding) spent eight months researching, conducting public consultations and comparing different electoral systems before recommending that Ontario adopt it. Now we just have to choose between our current system and MMP.
Michael Ufford of the “No MMP” campaign calls it unnecessarily complicated, yet Steve Withers of Fair Vote Canada's “Vote for MMP” campaign thinks that the system looks so good that Elections Ontario would appear biased if they explained properly. But as the two versions of the last election illustrate, choosing between systems is like choosing between two very different electoral realities.
Here's how these two realities play out: with our current first-past-the-post system, we elect members of parliament for each riding, and then the party with the most elected members makes up the government. We as voters don't exactly choose the government, we just hope that the party of the member we vote for gets enough other members elected to be in power. But whether or not our member is part of the government, at least they represent our riding.
What MMP offers is a hybrid system, which combines this kind of regional representation with the direct representation of also voting for a specific party. You still get to vote for the member in your riding, but you then cast a second vote for the party you want in power. So if you think Conservative John Tory will best represent the Don Valley West riding but like the NDP's national environmental policies, you get to support both. Conversely, if you know the Green Party is doomed in St. Paul's, your second vote will still count towards their total.
While voting twice isn't all that mind-blowing as a concept, calculating the results for MMP requires a bit of imagination. Parliament would increase from 107 to 129 seats and would then be split among 90 local members and an additional 39 list members. The local members will be determined by first-past-the-post results just like every previous election, but the list members (who are chosen from lists submitted by each party before the election) would be distributed to reflect each party's total number of votes. The total number of seats held by each party would roughly reflect their percentage of the vote.
The assembly's recommendation of this radical redistribution came with the belief that MMP would provide “fairer results, greater election choice, and stronger representation.” Fairer results depend entirely on whether voters want the government to be determined by how many members get elected or how many total votes a party gets. But election choice and stronger representation are already being hotly debated.
The new system would likely allow for more parties, which makes greater election choice a given. With a three per cent threshold for list members, smaller parties like the Green Party would be able to use their overall support to gain a seat in parliament even though they probably wouldn't win an actual riding. In light of an almost inevitable minority government, Ufford sees the new system as a way for these smaller fringe parties to hold the balance of power, and a potential for political gridlock.
However Withers champions additional parties for having the exact opposite effect: “Members can easily split off and create their own parties [so there will be] less vote towing. Most critics don't understand how powerful three per cent is for keeping party leaders in check.” Withers also points out that in countries like Germany and New Zealand – where he owns a farm and worked on their successful 1993 campaign for MMP – these smaller parties aren't single-issue extremist parties. “They want to become big parties,” he says, “so they want to be in the centre where the votes are.”
Although these smaller parties will provide a sense of stronger representation overall, it's not obvious at first whom exactly the 39 list members would represent. Withers, expects that “parties will want to distribute list members accordingly,” like they do in New Zealand. “PCs will locate members in Toronto where there currently are none and they will be able to offer constituency services and a voice for the region in the caucus,” he says.
But as ridings are reconfigured to accommodate the 90 local members, there would be 17 fewer ridings than in this year's election. Between this reduction and list candidates making up as much as 30 per cent of each party, Ufford sees the proposed system as a way for parties to actually become less flexible as “the basic shift in political power [will be] from local voters to much more control over the party apparatus at Queen's Park.”
Withers counters that, under the current system, “MPPs who aren't accountable to me are the ones in other ridings.” Since the list members are a direct representation of voter support for a party, they are completely accountable to those who voted for them. ”They are all swing votes,” he says, “and they are all equal.”
With such diametrically opposed campaigns both ultimately concerned with simply educating the public, it's no wonder that both Withers and Ufford urge the media to open up the debate. Ontario is allocating $6.8 million for the public education campaign (nearly twice what BC spent on its 2005 referendum), but until everyone gets back from summer vacation, the flow of information has been but a trickle.
Once you've exhausted Elections Ontario's referendum website, www.yourbigdecision.ca, it's worth checking out both www.voteformmp.ca and www.nommp.ca, for a more detailed analysis. We've all experienced enough election hangovers to anticipate just how painful a referendum hangover could be.
.
What are your thoughts re this? I'm inclined to vote for MMP, but I'm wary of unforeseen consequences. Aside from possible gridlock and other things mentioned in the article, what do you see as the 'risks' of switching to this system?
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
You say you want a referendum?
Actually, the majority of Ontarians aren't even aware of the upcoming vote that could alter the province's political landscape forever. And the ones who are aware are trying to understand what it all means
by Chris Bilton
Eye Weekly
August 30, 2007
http://www.eyeweekly.com/eye/issue/issue_08.30.07/city/news.php
While the 2003 Ontario election carried with it a euphoric post-Harris glow of a fresh new start, one significant thing remained unchanged: a minority government was still wielding a majority rule. Surely the fact that the Liberals could hold 70 per cent of the seats while only receiving 46 per cent of the popular vote had to be the result of some kind of residual common sense reorganization. But, in actual fact, every Ontario government since 1937 has technically been a minority. Despite both parties winning landslide elections, neither Harris' Conservatives nor even Dalton McGuinty's Liberals have managed to attract even half of the total votes.
Under an alternate system, namely the Mixed-Member Proportional (MMP) system being proposed in this fall's electoral referendum, the last election's results would have looked more like this: a Liberal minority government with the Conservatives and NDP together holding the balance of power, and the Green party coming within about 8,000 votes of getting an actual seat in the house.
Wait a minute. What's an MMP? And who said anything about a referendum?
So apparently nearly two-thirds of Ontarians aren't even aware of what their options are in the Oct. 10 referendum. But that doesn't change the fact that MMP represents the first ever choice of an alternative to our current system. A citizen's assembly made up of a random cross-section of 107 Ontarians (one from each riding) spent eight months researching, conducting public consultations and comparing different electoral systems before recommending that Ontario adopt it. Now we just have to choose between our current system and MMP.
Michael Ufford of the “No MMP” campaign calls it unnecessarily complicated, yet Steve Withers of Fair Vote Canada's “Vote for MMP” campaign thinks that the system looks so good that Elections Ontario would appear biased if they explained properly. But as the two versions of the last election illustrate, choosing between systems is like choosing between two very different electoral realities.
Here's how these two realities play out: with our current first-past-the-post system, we elect members of parliament for each riding, and then the party with the most elected members makes up the government. We as voters don't exactly choose the government, we just hope that the party of the member we vote for gets enough other members elected to be in power. But whether or not our member is part of the government, at least they represent our riding.
What MMP offers is a hybrid system, which combines this kind of regional representation with the direct representation of also voting for a specific party. You still get to vote for the member in your riding, but you then cast a second vote for the party you want in power. So if you think Conservative John Tory will best represent the Don Valley West riding but like the NDP's national environmental policies, you get to support both. Conversely, if you know the Green Party is doomed in St. Paul's, your second vote will still count towards their total.
While voting twice isn't all that mind-blowing as a concept, calculating the results for MMP requires a bit of imagination. Parliament would increase from 107 to 129 seats and would then be split among 90 local members and an additional 39 list members. The local members will be determined by first-past-the-post results just like every previous election, but the list members (who are chosen from lists submitted by each party before the election) would be distributed to reflect each party's total number of votes. The total number of seats held by each party would roughly reflect their percentage of the vote.
The assembly's recommendation of this radical redistribution came with the belief that MMP would provide “fairer results, greater election choice, and stronger representation.” Fairer results depend entirely on whether voters want the government to be determined by how many members get elected or how many total votes a party gets. But election choice and stronger representation are already being hotly debated.
The new system would likely allow for more parties, which makes greater election choice a given. With a three per cent threshold for list members, smaller parties like the Green Party would be able to use their overall support to gain a seat in parliament even though they probably wouldn't win an actual riding. In light of an almost inevitable minority government, Ufford sees the new system as a way for these smaller fringe parties to hold the balance of power, and a potential for political gridlock.
However Withers champions additional parties for having the exact opposite effect: “Members can easily split off and create their own parties [so there will be] less vote towing. Most critics don't understand how powerful three per cent is for keeping party leaders in check.” Withers also points out that in countries like Germany and New Zealand – where he owns a farm and worked on their successful 1993 campaign for MMP – these smaller parties aren't single-issue extremist parties. “They want to become big parties,” he says, “so they want to be in the centre where the votes are.”
Although these smaller parties will provide a sense of stronger representation overall, it's not obvious at first whom exactly the 39 list members would represent. Withers, expects that “parties will want to distribute list members accordingly,” like they do in New Zealand. “PCs will locate members in Toronto where there currently are none and they will be able to offer constituency services and a voice for the region in the caucus,” he says.
But as ridings are reconfigured to accommodate the 90 local members, there would be 17 fewer ridings than in this year's election. Between this reduction and list candidates making up as much as 30 per cent of each party, Ufford sees the proposed system as a way for parties to actually become less flexible as “the basic shift in political power [will be] from local voters to much more control over the party apparatus at Queen's Park.”
Withers counters that, under the current system, “MPPs who aren't accountable to me are the ones in other ridings.” Since the list members are a direct representation of voter support for a party, they are completely accountable to those who voted for them. ”They are all swing votes,” he says, “and they are all equal.”
With such diametrically opposed campaigns both ultimately concerned with simply educating the public, it's no wonder that both Withers and Ufford urge the media to open up the debate. Ontario is allocating $6.8 million for the public education campaign (nearly twice what BC spent on its 2005 referendum), but until everyone gets back from summer vacation, the flow of information has been but a trickle.
Once you've exhausted Elections Ontario's referendum website, www.yourbigdecision.ca, it's worth checking out both www.voteformmp.ca and www.nommp.ca, for a more detailed analysis. We've all experienced enough election hangovers to anticipate just how painful a referendum hangover could be.
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